Last year Houston-based United Airlines pilot Bruce Wayne Wallis was arrested for running “a string of brothels in apartment complexes throughout Houston.”
He had “a half-dozen brothel apartments with six to 10 women in each one.” The women paid him “$400 a week to ply their trade.”
However did the cops figure out it? (Not an actual photo of the apartments.)
Let’s assume 48 prostitutes at $400 a week, he was taking in about a million dollars a year less expenses. That’s twice what what the flight attendant for a Gulf carrier made actually sleeping with passengers inflight. And no doubt a lot more than the Japanese flight attendants were making who were doing it to make up for declining wages at their airline. There’s a lesson here about entrepreneurship and leverage.
As so often happens in these cases, 19 women were arrested on prostitution charges. No clients were arrested.
And Batman Bruce Wayne Wallis will even escape jail. He received 5 years ‘deferred adjudication probation’ and has to pay a $2000 fine and perform 150 hours of community service. By completing this service he won’t have a felony on his record. He won’t lose his pilots license. Though he was suspended from United when he was arrested, he needs the license to operate his flight school.
The sentence by state District Judge Jim Wallace drew sharp criticism from civil rights groups, who said black and Hispanic pimps and madams are routinely sentenced to decades of prison time while Bruce Wayne Wallis, who is white, was not. Wallace, a Republican, is also white.
Prosecutors sought up to 7 years in prison for the guilty plea, but the judge denied the request since there’s no evidence that anyone’s involvement in the enterprise was non-consensual.
I’m not sure the answer to racial disparities in sentencing is necessarily harsher sentences for white defendants as much as fairness for non-white defendants.
In this case original claims that Wallis was “using his position as a commercial pilot to move women, gold bars and millions of dollars in an international sex trafficking ring” turned out to be false.
He should start doing seminars for entrepreneurs!
Blue and White privilege
And here I was wanting to learn what a “pimp escape” entailed.
Where is the victim here?
Where is the victim here?
How about justice? Also, sexual exploitation of women and children is still a big problem. I bet the sex slaves were also poor, under educated, and vulnerable. I saw this in my previous profession and as a lawyer now, the judge should be recalled. No clawback of ill gotten gains? What a joke, but so is Texas.
“What a joke, but so is Texas”
You are clearly an intellectual titan.
Thought I would bring the intellectual discourse down to your level, so you could grasp the discussion and participate. Cheers!!
Jack.Johnson: That’s good of you. Think how much more you could do if you had the facts right!
The details rarely work out in these articles. 48 is the number of prostitutes, but 19 were arrested. Were these residents, or were the units empty unless someone booked a room? Of the 6 to 10 per unit, were they each paying 400 per week, 52 weeks per year, or was the unit rented out on a weekly basis, and potentially no revenue during the slow season?
The picture I am given is 6 to 10 people sharing an apt and each paying 400 per week. At 400 per week, wouldn’t they get there own place, or at least two or three get their own place together?
Also, did he generate leads, or was he the lessor?
Regarding the jail sentences, in our newspaper of record, “Just Busted”, the repeat criminals or arrestees are in and out of jail so quickly, we could only wish that an incentive of 150 hours community service and expungement of their felony record would be enough to deter future crimes.
I would not jump to the conclusion that the prostitutes or lessee’s are in jail while the pilot is picking up trash without getting more facts than presented in this article and it’s links.
Clearly, some prostitutes were let off or there are not 48. Around my town, prostitutes and shoplifters, etc, are catch and release offences…and future informants for more serious crimes.
No children were mentioned and no details given that support human trafficking or sex slaves. It sounds more like the hourly motel, of which I am no fan, but the article doesn’t support that assumption either.